'Cloud' Nine on Canapes

Queen's Wharf & the 'Cloud'

Rugby World cup is only a month away now and Auckland’s party central is almost complete. As a thank you to all the contractors and consultants, there were drinks and canapés served in the ‘Cloud’ situated on Queens Wharf. Because I was involved in a bit of work on Queens Wharf (not the ‘Cloud’) I got to tag along. At first I was like this is great, finally a non-public opening the food is going to be great. But a few days before the night disaster struck.

First of all, I caught a cold and was put on Anti-Biotics. This meant no drinking on the night. Secondly, I was told by the big guys at my firm that there was an ulterior motive for bringing me a long. I had to take photos to document the night and the space. On a side note, myself and a girl I work, with have accidently become company photographers for a while now. For me, it was after I took a few photos on a company site visit which turned out not too bad. Anyway, back to the food… my cold meant I couldn’t drink and could hardly taste anything and my photography role meant I was almost entirely preoccupied the whole night taking photos of the building rather than enjoying delicious canapés.

The 'VIP' area, where the event took place

Quite an awesome space

I arrived with the some others from my office at around 4:30pm. The event was held at the northern most end of the ‘Cloud’, in the ‘VIP’ area. The area itself was pretty impressive, with a spectacular view out into the Harbour. You could see (and hear) ferries zip past on their way to Davenport. Although the interior had yet to be finished (see photos for the blue tarpaulin on the ground), I could tell that there were going to be some awesome parties come world cup.

A bar was made up serving wine, Monteiths, Steinlagers and of course Heinekens (this is probably the last time anything apart from Heineken beer will be seen on the wharf). Trays of finger food were scattered around the room, in a self-serve manner.

I started off with a few pieces of chicken sushi. Since sushi is already pretty tame in the flavour department, I pretty much couldn’t taste any of it. I always find it funny seeing sushi at events such as these, the giant wasabi ball always turns an un-appetizing grey and there are always only 3 sets of chop sticks. I then looked towards the bar to see if there was anything non-alcoholic. To my delight there was lemonade and real lemonade too.

Following my drink I had to go all over the wharf taking photos of the ‘Cloud’, the landscaping and furniture outside and the Shed 10 refurbishment.

Chilling out on the balcony

Finally, after going trigger happy with the camera I could get back to the appetizers. I tried out some of the more elaborate dishes next (unfortunately, I didn't take any photos of the food as I was pre-occupied taking photos of the building). I had some crumbed gelatinous seafood thing, which was very interesting. Of course I couldn’t taste it, but it felt like chewing on jelly with chunky bits. Next was the typical bruschetta and meatballs on a stick. But what was new, were these mini tart things with some sort of cream cheese and roast beef topping. I could just make out through my minimal taste capacity that they were delicious.

So overall a good night for canapés, and next time I will endeavour to take a few snaps of the food.   

Thursday 12th May: Inlite NZ Launch Party

The Oysters

When it comes to good catering it seems that lighting companies are pretty awesome at it. Earlier this year we had a presentation from a lighting company, called Modus, about how they are bringing in We-Ef lighting products. When they came to show us their products they bought us lunch as well. It was good. There were chicken skewers, mini quesadillas, mini pies and a whole heap of other stuff. To top that off they bought desert too…little chocolate cakes and other sweet stuff. Bringing lunch is one but bringing desert for that free lunch is a whole new level.

Another lighting company called InLite (http://www.inlite.com.au/), had a launch party last Thursday for the launch of their New Zealand branch. We found out about it when one of my colleagues used their products for a project. One of InLite’s representatives came to our office to explain about what they could do for us, at the same time he dropped off a stack of invitations. On a side note, the guy was called Chris Watt…he was destined to work for a lighting company with a last name like that.

Filo Parcel

The event took place at Bubble, a bar on the Viaduct Harbour and following in the footsteps of other lighting companies there were canapés. As a few of my colleagues and I arrived at the opening, we were greeted by a tray of champagne flutes filled with Veuve Clicquot and we knew it was gonna be a good night.

Moments later I got my first canapé, a fresh oyster served with a tangy relish. It was delicious; the relish gave the oyster a sweet citrus flavour that was so much better than a simple squeeze of lemon juice. It was so good that by the end of the night I had eaten at least five of those.

After eating the oyster I caught up with my work friends and we then realised that this event was open bar. We decided to take it easy and just get what was on tap…Speight’s Summit Lager. However, one of my work colleagues decided he would reach the peak of this Summit and get trollied. But, he claims that no matter how much he drinks, drinking a can of coke just before he sleeps ensures that he will not be hung over the next day.

Later on (but before my work mate got drunk), I caught up with a few of my friends that I went to University with. We sat at a pretty sweet table where we were in the direct line of waiters bringing out fresh nibbles from the kitchen.

Next on the menu was deep fried filo parcels with a ricotta cheese filling. They were pretty tasty; however, it may have been because the dipping sauce it came with was really good. The same sauce was dished out with deep fried calamari. I am a fan of battered calamari so I guess I was already partial to giving the calamari a good review.

All the deep fried food had to be washed down with another glass of Summit Beer. I can’t decide whether Summit is actually a good beer or that the fact that it was free made it good, I guess I have to have a bought one to figure that out.

Meatballs

Being all refreshed I was ready for another round, this started with meat balls with a spicy tomato sauce. Usually meat balls are really good but I was kinda of disappointed at these one, they were dry, but because I was starving by the time they came I did eat four of five meat balls. Next was chicken skewers, these on the other hand were surprisingly good. The chicken was tender and juicy and the aioli that came with it topped it off.

All in all I think the event was a success and the catering was generally of a very high quality and me and my friends managed to convince one of the waitresses to just drop whole plates of nibbles at our table instead of walking around with the platter. 

Open bar is always a plus, and being greeted with champagne is a double plus. 

I hope the next event will be equally good or better.